Crain's editorial: A lofty update

Leisure travelers rate airports on the quality of food courts, the number of phone-charging stations, the shops, the skylights. For business travelers, who make up the majority of plane passengers, it's all about four words: Easy in, easy out.

Fly into LAX or O'Hare or LaGuardia and you'll quickly realize that on this important measure, Cleveland Hopkins is a gem. Where else can you touch down, pick up a car or jump on the rapid and be downtown, all in 45 minutes?

But even the most comfortable and dependable shoes need to be shined.

The décor of Hopkins' main terminal — and baggage area especially — can be accurately described as outdated, with low ceilings, dreary lighting and sketchy bathrooms. If a city's airport makes a first impression, many parts of ours seem to be giving visitors the equivalent of a dead-fish handshake.

But that is changing. Last week, the airport revealed plans for a $20 million facelift to the ticket lobby, baggage claim area and facade.

Some critics will say the upgrades, announced less than three months after United Airlines pulled the plug on its Cleveland hub, are foolish. Why shore up and repaint the barn when two-thirds of the horses have escaped?

In truth, the renovations are long overdue. The main terminal should be a warm, airy welcome mat to a new Cleveland, not a bleak look back to the days of George Kennedy “Airport” movies. It should offer an atmosphere that matches its easy-in, easy-out convenience.

The cash for the project is coming from unspent general airline revenue bonds, so airlines, passengers and the airport itself will not face additional costs.

Smart business people and cities look at setbacks — whether it's an unsuccessful product launch or the loss of airline hub — not as a failure but as an opportunity. We encourage the city and the airport to push ahead with renovations and then keep going. We want a reimagined airport befitting our reimagined city.

Step up

We call the center of downtown Public Square, but if we wanted to be accurate, we'd call it “Public Squares.” Superior Avenue and Ontario Street gouge the space into four smaller quadrants, allowing traffic and noise to rob the area of its potential as a pedestrian zone and green space.

The Group Plan Commission has bold and courageous plans to bring the pieces together and create a stunning new center of downtown. The proposal calls for the closing of Ontario Street in the square. Traffic on Superior will likely be limited to buses only. The result will be 5 1/2 acres of park-like space.

If all goes according to plan, a summer night on Public Square will see families watching an outdoor movie on a massive lawn, children playing in a new fountain and couples chatting at cafes. Sounds great, right?

There's a problem. The plan will cost about $30 million, and for the new spaces to be ready for a 2016 presidential convention, construction needs to begin soon. The project sits at a fork: action or inaction.

Daniel H. Burnham — the mind behind Cleveland's original Group Plan of 1903 — famously advised, “Make no little plans.” We'd like to see the potential funders of this marvelous plan — corporations, foundations, the philanthropic community — step up soon and make no little contributions.

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